# Monitoring Network Packets Drops in Kernel

The network stack in Linux can discard packets for various reasons. Some Linux kernels include a tracepoint, `kernel.trace("kfree_skb")`, which easily tracks where packets are discarded. dropwatch uses `kernel.trace("kfree_skb")` to trace packet discards; the script summarizes which locations discard packets every five-second interval.

## dropwatch.stp

The `kernel.trace("kfree_skb")` traces which places in the kernel drop network packets. The `kernel.trace("kfree_skb")` has two arguments: a pointer to the buffer being freed (`$skb`) and the location in kernel code the buffer is being freed (`$location`). The dropwatch script provides the function containing `$location` where possible. The information to map `$location` back to the function is not in the instrumentation by default. On SystemTap 1.4 the `--all-modules` option will include the required mapping information and the following command can be used to run the script:

    stap --all-modules dropwatch.stp

On older versions of SystemTap you can use the following command to emulate the `--all-modules` option:

    stap -dkernel \
    `cat /proc/modules | awk 'BEGIN { ORS = " " } {print "-d"$1}'` \
    dropwatch.stp

Running the dropwatch.stp script 15 seconds would result in output similar in dropwatchoutput. The output lists the number of misses for each tracepoint location with either the function name or the address.

## dropwatch Sample Output

    Monitoring for dropped packets

    Tue Nov 17 00:26:51 2020
    1762 packets dropped at unix_stream_recvmsg
    4 packets dropped at tun_do_read
    2 packets dropped at nf_hook_slow

    Tue Nov 17 00:26:56 2020
    467 packets dropped at unix_stream_recvmsg
    20 packets dropped at nf_hook_slow
    6 packets dropped at tun_do_read

    Tue Nov 17 00:27:01 2020
    446 packets dropped at unix_stream_recvmsg
    4 packets dropped at tun_do_read
    4 packets dropped at nf_hook_slow
    Stopping dropped packet monitor

When the script is being compiled on one machine and run on another the `--all-modules` and `/proc/modules` directory are not available; the `symname` function will just print out the raw address. To make the raw address of packet drops more meaningful, refer to the `/boot/System.map-`uname -r`` file. This file lists the starting addresses for each function, allowing you to map the addresses in the output of dropwatchoutput to a specific function name. Given the following snippet of the `/boot/System.map-`uname -r`` file, the address 0xffffffff8149a8ed maps to the function `unix_stream_recvmsg`:

    [...]
    ffffffff8149a420 t unix_dgram_poll
    ffffffff8149a5e0 t unix_stream_recvmsg
    ffffffff8149ad00 t unix_find_other
    [...]